Top Pixar Executive Pete Docter Blames Moviegoers For ‘Lightyear’s’ Box Office Bomb
Pixar Chief Operating Officer Pete Docter recently put the blame on moviegoers, or in this case, people who didn’t go see Lightyear for the film’s box office disaster.
Lightyear only grossed $118.3 million at the domestic box office and $100.4 million internationally for a global gross of $218.7 million.
The film’s reported production budget was $200 million meaning the film was a financial disaster for Pixar and The Walt Disney Company.
RELATED: Disney’s Lightyear Flops At The Box Office Following Chris Evans Comments On Same Sex Kiss Scene
Speaking with TheWrap, Doceor explained why he and Pixar believed the film performed terribly at the box office. He said, “We’ve done a lot of soul-searching about that because we all love the movie. We love the characters and the premise. I think probably what we’ve ended on in terms of what went wrong is that we asked too much of the audience.”
Docter elaborated, “When they hear Buzz, they’re like, great, where’s Mr. Potato Head and Woody and Rex? And then we drop them into this science fiction film that they’re like, What?”
He continued, “Even if they’ve read the material in press, it was just a little too distant, both in concept, and I think in the way that characters were drawn, that they were portrayed. It was much more of a science fiction.”
“And Angus, to his credit, took it very seriously and genuinely and wanted to represent those characters as real characters. But the characters in ‘Toy Story’ are much broader, and so I think there was a disconnect between what people wanted/expected and what we were giving to them,” he added.
Of note, Docter does not mention the film was the most recent release after The Walt Disney Company admitted they were grooming young children through their content to spite a Florida law banning instruction on gender identity and sexual orientation in the classroom.
Former Disney CEO Bob Chapek sent a company-wide email to Disney where he made his and the company’s intentions clear, “Because this struggle is much bigger than any one bill in any one state, I believe the best way for our company to bring about lasting change is through the inspiring content we produce, the welcoming culture we create, and the diverse community organizations we support.”
“There’s a reason content is at the top of this list,” Chapek penned. “For nearly a century, our company’s stories have opened minds, inspired dreams, shown the world both as it is and how we wish it could be, and now more than ever before, represent the incredible diversity of our society.”
“We are telling important stories, raising voices, and I believe, changing hearts and minds,” he added.
He later added, “Powerful content that changes hearts and minds only springs from inclusive cultures, which not only attract and retain the best and most diverse talent, but also give those employees the freedom to bring forth ideas that reflect their lives and experiences. We must work together to ensure Disney always remains such a place.”
On top of this email from Chapek, Disney Latoya Raveneau confirmed the company had a “not-at-all-secret gay agenda.”
She said, ““In my little pocket of Proud Family Disney TVA, the showrunners were super welcoming . Meredith Roberts and our leadership over there has been so welcoming to my not-at-all-secret gay agenda.”
“Maybe it was that way in the past, but I guess something must have happened in the last, they are turning it around, they’re going hard, and then like all that momentum that I felt, that sense of ‘I don’t have to be afraid to have these two characters kiss in the background.’ I was just, wherever I could, just basically adding queerness. If you see anything queer in the show — no one would stop me, and no one was trying to stop me,” she revealed.
SCOOP: I’ve obtained video from inside Disney’s all-hands meeting about the Florida parental rights bill, in which executive producer Latoya Raveneau says her team has implemented a “not-at-all-secret gay agenda” and is regularly “adding queerness” to children’s programming. pic.twitter.com/eJnZMpKIXT
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) March 29, 2022
RELATED: Report: Disney And Pixar’s Lightyear Film’s Same-Sex Couple “Pretty Front And Center” At CinemaCon
To this point, numerous reports indicated that Disney made it clear to market a gay relationship that they put in Lightyear. Industry analyst Matthew Belloni tweeted back in April 2022, “Florida’s gonna love Disney’s LIGHTYEAR. The same-sex couple is pretty front and center in an extended sequence.”
YouTuber Robert Meyer Burnett also tweeted, “Disney showed 30 minutes of LIGHTYEAR. If you told me I’d have tears streaming down my checks 25 minutes in, I’d have said you were nuts. But here we are.”
He added, “Also, best earned LGBTQ representation I’ve seen in awhile. First animated film in the IMAX ratio. A must-see in the format.”
RELATED: Chris Evans Calls Critics Of Lightyear’s Gay Kiss “Idiots” As His Film Is Banned In the Middle East
Not only would Disney’s exclusive clip at CinemaCon make it clear the film was pushing disordered lifestyles on children, but Buzz Lightyear’s voice actor, Chris Evans, decided to lampoon critics of Disney’s obvious attempt at grooming children.
He told Reuters, “The real truth is those people are idiots. I mean, I think throughout history you can see every time there’s been social advancement as we wake up, the American story, the human story is one of constant social awakening and growth and that’s what makes us good.”
Evans continued, “And then, you know, when that happens, there’s always going to be people who are afraid and unaware and trying to hold on to what was before. But those people die off like dinosaurs.”
“The goal is to pay them no mind, march forward, and embrace the growth that makes us human,” he concluded.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Docter would blame moviegoers and audiences for the film’s failure. Evans, as noted above, was attacking them before the film even released and the film’s director Angus MacLane blamed “trolls” for the film’s low reviews on IMDb.
He wrote on Twitter, “Short answer: much like the second chapter of THE HOBBIT, it mainly has to do with trolls.”
This is also the playbook that Disney has employed for nearly all of their failures including Star Wars and more recently Marvel Studios productions.
What do you make of Pixar’s Pete Docter picking up Lucasfilm’s tired playbook of blaming moviegoers for their film’s failures?
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